


he made me feel (like i belonged)

by estel_willow



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Conversations, Episode 11 Coda, F/M, M/M, Mentions of Alex's Disability, post episode 11
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-11
Updated: 2019-04-11
Packaged: 2020-01-11 20:08:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,703
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18431201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/estel_willow/pseuds/estel_willow
Summary: He heard the sound of giggling from inside and then Michael's voice, soft and low. He knew he should move away but some masochistic part of him had him standing where he was as he heard Maria say Michael's name in a way thatdefinitelywasn't platonic and the bottom dropped out of his stomach. He felt nauseated.Blood was pounding in his ears and Alex just stood there dumbly for a moment before he shrugged off his backpack and put it on the floor, just underneath the steps where it was obscured but Michael would know it was there as soon as he moved the trailer to go into his bunker.He breathed out again, past the cloying tightness in his chest. Hadn't they just talked about starting over? Doing it the right way? Hadn't Maria promised him it would never happen again, that it had meant nothing? The way she moaned his name didn't sound like the moan of a dirty, no good, Texas rounder.





	he made me feel (like i belonged)

**Author's Note:**

> So I suddenly got inspired and wrote this in an afternoon. A huge shout out to ~maneswrites on Tumblr for helping me come up with a title and generally doing a little bit of cheerleading when I was flailing about how I swore I wouldn't fall down a fic writing rabbit hole.

It had been a long few days since he'd last spoken to Michael, since he'd been introduced into Guerin's world, the secret bunker and the hopes he held of leaving, of getting home and going somewhere else that wasn't here, since he'd said that they would talk later because he needed time to process. Alex wasn't big-headed enough to think that Michael was running away from _him_ specifically, but that was what it felt like when he saw the look on Michael's face as he pieced it together. Michael wanted to leave the planet. Find his family. Find his _home_. 

And Alex... Alex knew he wouldn't be enough for Michael to stay. Whatever they felt for each other - whatever he felt now for Michael - wasn't enough to try and hold him back from finding somewhere to belong. A part of him had hoped that might be together, two adults who had never really been loved or had much to call their own navigating the world together. It was why he'd wanted to start over, have a conversation, get to know Guerin outside of the bedroom because since he'd come back if they weren't fighting, they were fucking and if they weren't doing that... if they weren't doing that then Alex was walking away. Being back in Roswell was messing with his head and Michael wasn't the only thing that made him feel seventeen again. 

Jesse Manes might have been gone but his shadow remained. His voice lingered in the back of Alex's mind. He'd spent his entire life trying to mould himself into the man he thought his father would want, to be more like his brothers, to be a real Manes man. But it wasn't Alex. Sure, he was highly ranked and respected as a Captain, as an officer. He had worked hard for that, and that had all been down to him, not his family legacy. 

Either of them.

He'd been meaning to take the piece back for a while, had been meaning to since the day after the revelation but he'd been holding onto it. He'd hidden it for a while as if him not being able to see it meant that it was less shitty of him to be keeping it away from Michael. From where it belonged. After all, Michael had told him that the pieces wanted to be together, and at the time maybe Alex had thought there was a second later to that but he wasn't so sure now. 

Liz had told him about what had happened. Her voice had been frantic and panicked when she'd begged Alex to tell her what he knew before everything came spilling out of her, the 4th alien who had been doing the killings was _Noah_ , how he'd tried to take out Max and Michael, how they had both been trapped in the bunker, hurt and- 

Alex had stopped listening at that point, his brain freezing on repeat at Michael-Hurt-Trapped. He knew that they had to be okay, obviously, otherwise the phone call would have been completely different in tone but at the same time he couldn't shake the feeling that he had to go and see Michael. Had to check he was okay and see with his own two eyes. 

He was halfway to the car when Liz's words slowed and he heard the soft rumble of Max's voice echo quietly down the line. He told her it was okay, she should get some rest and he would talk to her later, that she could call him in the morning. He could stew for hours on the fact that it was early evening now and he was only just hearing about this. That it had all happened _the night before_ and no one had told him.

But then... why would they? He hadn't wanted anyone to know about Michael and him, that horror sitting deep in the pit of his stomach at the thought of someone - _his father_ \- finding them - _finding Michael_ \- and hurting them all over again. He wouldn't watch Michael fall under the weight of someone else's war again, under someone else's vendetta. But here he was, paying the price for that decision, kept out of the loop when Michael could have died and he wouldn't have even known.

It took him fifteen minutes to calm his breathing before he remembered that he'd forgotten the fucking shard, so headed back into the cabin to pull it out from where he'd hidden it, rubbing his thumb over the pale pink sheen guiltily, watching it react in a spectrum of ripples and rainbows to his touch. It was beautiful, and it would give Michael what he'd never had; a choice. 

Tucked safely away in his bag, the shard sat in the passenger seat like a crucifix as Alex drove the hour and a half to the junkyard.

***

By the time he'd gotten to the junkyard, it was getting close to twilight. His truck slowed and stopped when he put on the brakes and cut the engine which killed the lights that had illuminated the trailer. He stayed where he was just for a moment because he thought he saw movement and needed to just take a second to work out who it might have been before deciding that he honestly didn't care.

He just needed to see Michael, needed to do this right. Needed Michael to understand how he felt, how he- 

Alex took another breath and rubbed his hands over his face, through his hair and gripped the back of his neck before blowing it out slowly and opening the driver's door, climbing out and carefully tugging the backpack with him. The door was nudged shut quietly and he made his way over towards the trailer. 

He heard the sound of giggling from inside and then Michael's voice, soft and low. He knew he should move away but some masochistic part of him had him standing where he was as he heard Maria say Michael's name in a way that _definitely_ wasn't platonic and the bottom dropped out of his stomach. He felt nauseated. 

Blood was pounding in his ears and Alex just stood there dumbly for a moment before he shrugged off his backpack and put it on the floor, just underneath the steps where it was obscured but Michael would know it was there as soon as he moved the trailer to go into his bunker. 

He breathed out again, past the cloying tightness in his chest. Hadn't they just talked about starting over? Doing it the right way? Hadn't Maria promised him it would never happen again, that it had meant nothing? The way she moaned his name didn't sound like the moan of a dirty, no good, Texas rounder. 

His chest was tight, it hurt to breathe and he knew as he stumbled back towards the car, equilibrium off, hips burning, that he'd knocked over a couple of the deck chairs, sent them crashing into the fire pit. 

He didn't look back at the airstream, not even when it was lit up with lights as he turned the truck back on. Not even when he thought he saw the blinds twitch and someone look out. He just pulled away and drove out, leaving a dissipating dust cloud settling behind him.

***

Valenti had long since stopped knocking and no one else came out here, so when there was an insistent hammering on his door at ten thirty that night, Alex was disgruntled, confused and unsettled. He'd taken off his prosthetic for the evening since he would be going to bed soon and had been eating potato chips and drinking beer for the last couple of hours since his trip to the junkyard so he wasn't much in the mood for company.

Still, the knocking was persistent and Alex got to his foot, his armpit crutch - used exclusively when he didn't have his prosthetic on and therefore was literally one legged - tucked under his right arm he picked his way to the door.

"Hang on," he called, flicking the porch light on and unlocking the door, pulling it open a fraction to see- "Guerin?"

"Alex."

Michael said his name like all the breath rushed out of his lungs and Alex felt himself frowning. He moved to push the door shut since he hadn't even undone the chain but Michael's fingers slipped in and curled around the door, like if his hand was there Alex wouldn't just slam it shut. He was right to be confident; Alex had done enough damage to that hand. Still, he didn't want to see Michael right now.

There was a pretty fresh memory of feeling a knife between his shoulderblades dug there by someone who had promised him it wouldn't happen again. Twisted by someone he thought he'd been working on a relationship with.

More fool him.

"Alex, will you open the door?"

"No, Guerin, it's late, I'm tired and I don't really think we have anything to talk about." Barnes had always joked that when Alex was tired and borderline drunk he turned into a bit of a pissy queen. Barnes and Walker would be pissing themselves right now if they could see him. Well, actually, that wasn't a fair assessment. If they'd been here and saw him trying to stand with his right pant leg tied in a knot under his knee so he didn't trip on it, tired and hurting, they'd have answered the door to Guerin, punched him in the face, told him to fuck off and then come back to make Alex drink so much beer he forgot his own name. Then they'd make fun of him in the morning. 

But they weren't here. None of his squad was. He was, as he tended to be, alone. 

"We really need to talk, Alex, and I'm not going anywhere until-"

"Until what, Michael?" Alex asked, exhausted, nudging the door shut a little just so he could release the chain and pull it open properly. He didn't miss how Michael's gaze swept over him like a man dying of thirst looking at an oasis. He didn't miss how that gaze lingered on the knotted pant leg or the crutch that was different from the one he was used to seeing. "My eyes are up here, Guerin."

The shift from 'Michael' to 'Guerin' wasn't missed on Alex, his own way of keeping him at arm's length, he thought. He'd always been Guerin outside of the bedroom, and that slip to Michael was probably going to come back to haunt him.

"Sorry," Michael muttered, dragging his eyes away from the knotted pant leg, up the armpit crutch like suddenly he was realising that it was probably hard for Alex to be standing upright and he looked shocked with himself. "Oh shit, Alex- I- you should sit down."

"Not until I know what you're doing here," Alex argued. His underarm was hurting, unused to the pressure of the crutch since he used it so rarely. "What do you want?"

Michael shrugged the backpack off his shoulder. Alex recognised it as the one he'd abandoned earlier. 

"Where did you get this?"

Alex's eyebrow lifted. "The backpack?" he asked, being deliberately obtuse. "I don't remember. Walmart, maybe. You can keep it. I have another one."

Michael's jaw ticked. "You know that's not what I'm talking about."

Alex tipped his chin up, held Michael's gaze. He knew he was being petty and difficult, he knew that any high road he might have had was rapidly slipping away from him but he didn't care. He was hurt. Why was he supposed to make this easy on anyone? He'd missed out on something that Michael and Maria had bonded over. He'd missed out on something _serious_ , the fourth alien had been found and he and Kyle had to find out second hand? He had wanted to just finish this without having to include Michael, Isobel or Max. The fourth alien had done enough to them. He was pissed and petty because he'd heard Michael and Maria hooking up and-

And he was _hurt_. 

Alex had always been able to handle physical pain. Being the youngest and smallest of four boys he'd gotten good at handling roughhousing. He'd gotten better after their father had started joining in. Physical pain was second nature to him. Emotional pain, emotional vulnerability, was terrifying. It was easier to walk away from that, to defend himself from the inevitable. And today had been that inevitable. He knew it was his fault; he'd pushed and pushed and Michael was bound to just stop at some point, but... but _Maria_?

"I found it."

Michael's eyebrows lifted and his head shook slightly, curls flopping over his forehead, expression expectant. Alex's fingers itched to reach out and brush them away, to bury in the lengths and use them as an anchor to pull Michael closer. But he didn't. That wasn't fair to anyone. Not to him, not to Michael and, god help him, not to Maria. 

What was wrong with him?

He blinked out of his thoughts when he saw Michael looking at him, that expectant expression still there, edged with frustration and something else that Alex was hesitant to name. Something else Alex _refused_ to name. For his own sanity.

"What else did you find?"

"Nothing."

"And?"

"And what?"

"Is that it?"

"I don't know what else you want me to say, Michael?" Alex said, wearily. Even to his own ears his tone was exhausted, defeated. "I don't know what you want from me right now. You've got better places to be than here."

Michael frowned, "Like where?" 

The words blurted out before Alex could stop himself. "Like, with Maria?"

Michael's expression dropped, instantly he became guarded, his shoulders lifted and his jaw set. Alex recognised the look. It had never really been worn around him before. Next, he knew, would come the disaffected swagger, the smug cowboy front that he put on to show the world that he didn't give a shit what it, or anyone else thought of him, so he couldn't be hurt by it. 

Alex held up his hand when Michael opened his mouth to speak.

"I heard you two earlier. When I came to give you that. I think it's the final piece of the console you're looking for."

He swallowed, forcing himself to continue even as he saw the broken-hopeful look in Michael's eyes.

"I- I wanted to tell you that it was selfish of me to keep it from you. That wasn't fair to be the one to take that choice away from you like everyone else did. So... congratulations, Michael." Alex was proud of the way his voice only broke a little bit. Michael's brows were furrowed, his lips pressed together in that way Alex knew meant he was struggling to hold himself in check. "You can go home."

He cleared his throat and looked away, shuffling backwards awkwardly and putting his hand on the door, moving to close it. The conversation was over, there was nothing else to say. 

"Why?"

Alex stopped, the door was half shut and he looked up. Michael hadn't moved (though he knew that, since he'd been looking at those stupid boots). 

"Why what?"

Michael wet his lower lip, raked a hand through his hair. "Why did you give it to me?"

"Because it's yours," Alex responded simply and knew that his expression was begging Michael to just leave it at that. "Can't keep something that doesn't belong to me." He wet his lower lip, saw Michael's eyes dart down to look at his mouth. "Besides, you said it yourself. The pieces want to be together. Who am I to keep them apart?"

And if that was laced with slightly bitchy subtext then so be it. 

"Goodnight, Michael."

He moved to continue shutting the door but this time a foot was wedged in the doorway. Alex let out a heavy sigh and stopped pushing.

"Michael, I said goodnight. I can't do this right now."

"That's the third time you've said my name, Alex," Michael said softly, a tone of gentle wonder in his voice that Alex only heard when Michael was whispering things against his skin. It made a thrill run up his spine and he hated it. 

"Sorry," Alex sniped. "Goodnight _Guerin_." He tipped his head. "That better?"

Michael looked hurt. He even recoiled a little. Alex hated the guilt that twisted in his stomach at the look. He thought he might feel satisfied by getting a jab in, he was wrong. 

"Just one more question."

"What?"

"Why 'selfish'?"

Alex frowned. "What?"

"Why did you say it would have been selfish of you to keep this?"

Michael took the shard out of the bag and held it in his hands, cradled it like it was fragile. Like it held his entire future within it, and he supposed it did.

Alex met Michael's questioning gaze and his brows furrowed, moving with the effort it was taking for him to do mental gymnastics with himself. On the one hand, he thought, he could be honest and tell Michael the truth. Lay it bare for the other man - alien? whatever - and for the world to see. The safer option, the one that would only hurt him was to lie. Or... or to edit the truth slightly.

Alex chose neither of those options.

"Does it matter anymore?" he settled on asking, wearied and hurt and just _done_ with this conversation. 

"It matters, Alex," Michael said firmly, pushing the door open and letting himself in and only looking slightly guilty that he was only able to do that because Alex was tired and not in possession of both feet. Alex, at this point, didn't argue. He just turned around on the spot and started walking away. It was his house. He could do what he wanted here.

Michael didn't seem satisfied with that.

"Hey."

He reached out, caught Alex's arm which threw off his momentum and caused him to stumble. He didn't actually fall, though, because even as he dropped his left shoulder in preparation to roll - they'd taught him how to fall to avoid damage during his rehabilitation - he felt the air harden around him like a cushion, Michael's hand still on his wrist but his expression was set in concentration, his chin lifted slightly and as it did, Alex felt the pressure in front of him (that felt like hands he knew intimately) adjust and nudge him upright, too, rebalancing him. The sensation didn't go away until Michael looked confident that Alex wasn't going to fall again, and even then Alex almost felt it hovering around him.

Michael cleared his throat, looked ready to apologise, but Alex stopped him with a 'thank you'. 

"Still," Michael muttered. "Shoulda been more careful before I-"

"Grabbed my arm in my own house?" Alex deadpanned. "Yeah, you should."

Michael flinched. "I deserved that."

Alex, like the mature adult he was, didn't respond with the _yeah you did_ that was biting on the edge of his tongue. Instead, he just breathed a couple of times and secured his grip on his crutch. 

"It matters," Michael repeated softly, in that tone Alex hated because it made him want to just give in and let Michael push him up against the wall. "Alex, I need to know."

"Why?" Alex challenged, his voice breaking a fraction. Exhaustion and alcohol and heartbreak were on the edge of his tongue, betrayal still stung on his skin at the thought of what he'd seen only a few hours earlier that day. It was all too fresh. "What do you want to know, Michael? Why I didn't knock? You were _busy_. Why I don't want to talk about it now? Because I'm _hurt_. Because whatever I thought we were doing, I was obviously wrong. Because I have to believe that if you were going to- to _hook up_ with Maria for a second time it wouldn't just be a passing fling because she deserves better than that."

Michael closed his mouth.

"Because I was- because I thought that if we did it the right way, and we talked, and I learned more about you that we could finally give this-" he waved his hand between them, "- a proper chance." He wasn't pleased with how broken and pathetic the laugh that escaped him then sounded. Humourless and full of heartache. That was his new life motto. "But I get it, okay? And if that's not what you-"

"That's not what I want to know."

"Why don't you ask Maria," Alex said finally. "She knows why I wouldn't want you to leave the planet."

Michael still looked confused and conflicted. His hand was gripping the ship piece tightly, the rainbow ripple was still beautiful, even if it looked like Michael might be gripping it a bit too tightly. 

"Why would Maria know?"

Alex scoffed. "Because she knows how I feel about you, Michael. I told her. So if you're looking for my blessing you can't-" He cut himself off, forced himself to swallow. "I just want you to be happy, Michael, and if Maria's the one to give you that then fine."

Rubbing his free hand over his face, Alex just sighed again and looked up at Michael, the fight drained from him. 

"How you _feel_?" Michael asked that hopeful tone back in his voice. He looked like a puppy that had just been offered a home. Alex wanted to kick himself for the way he wanted to reach out to Michael again. 

"I told you, it doesn't matter."

"It matters to me."

"No," Alex snapped, turning to face Michael properly. "It doesn't. I told you I wanted to start over, I told you I wanted to get to know you, I told you I wanted-" _to be friends_ , was that what had thrown Guerin? Was that why he'd decided things were over? "I wanted to do it right, Mi- I wanted to do it _right_ so we had more to our relationship than fighting and sex. I wanted to _talk_ , so that the connection we have is- is real."

"It is real," Michael insisted, taking a step forwards but Alex took half of one back. Michael froze in place.

"But it's based on nothing but a feeling. An- an _intense_ feeling but we- we never knew each other and I wanted to make sure we had something else. You're the one that-"

"You walked away again," Michael managed, his voice quieter than Alex had ever heard. There was no swagger or bluster, no confidence or snark. Michael looked at him and Alex felt like the other man had never been so naked before him. "In the bunker. You left. Again. I waited, I hoped you'd- I hoped you'd come back and you didn't."

Alex swallowed. "I told you that I'd talk to you later, Guerin."

"How long is later supposed to take?" 

"I told you I needed time to process everything, that you-"

"That I'm an alien fuck up that no one ever wanted? Yeah, I figured." The sass was back, that moment of vulnerability swept away in a torrent of self-loathing that Michael wore around himself like a cloak, the acerbic humour that had protected him for all these years.

Alex narrowed his eyes. "Sure, Guerin," he bit, "never mind I've had weeks to get used to the alien stuff. Nothing to do with finding out that the _man I love_ is intending on building a ship to leave the planet. It's a little different from Tennesee, isn't it."

He realised what he'd said just a split second before Michael did. Alex tensed his shoulders, Michael's head jerked up, they both looked at each other and were stuck. Alex had never really been that interested in space but he'd read a lot about black holes, how they existed and eventually drew everything around them into the abyss. Michael was like that; he'd been clinging onto the event horizon for years, afraid to let go and sink into Michael completely: what would people say, what would they think, what would his dad do, what would his brothers say? But sometimes it was easy to think about letting go and falling into the abyss. Michael had always made him feel loved. Safe. Like he belonged somewhere. 

Michael tensed like he was about to move, trying not to look like all of his Christmas and birthdays had come at once. He was failing. Alex realised that the problem had been 'friends' it had been 'I loved you'. It had been the communication and the panic, the lack of explanation that he couldn't give at the time because all he'd been able to hear was that Michael wanted to _leave_. 

"Don't."

"Why not?" Michael asked, and it was always so simple. Michael wanted Alex, and he knew Alex wanted him back (that had never been a problem, Alex craved Michael's touch like an addict, never satisfied unless Michael's fingers and lips were on his skin, the brush of stubble against his neck, the way that breath ghosting across the hollow of his throat could make him gasp in the best way, breathless with anticipation of what was to come next). So what was stopping them?

"Maria."

The wheels in Michael's brain visibly screeched to a halt and Alex just gave him a smile that was humourless. Humourless and full of heartache. He could feel it on his face. He rubbed his hand over his forehead, then through his hair, fingers catching on the scar that sat just behind his left ear from the same IED explosion that had cost him his leg. 

"I think you should go, Michael."

"Alex-"

"No, please." Alex wouldn't be the one that kissed someone while they were hooking up with his best friend. He wouldn't be the one that broke something up that maybe Maria would be happy about. He wasn't going to be that guy. "I need you to leave." He wasn't proud of the way his voice sounded at that moment.

He could see Michael's heart breaking. The shine of his eyes told Alex that if Michael allowed himself to blink they would drip down his cheeks in rivulets he couldn't kiss away. The slight tremble to his lower lip told Alex that if he touched Michael right now the other man would crack and break and fall to pieces right in front of him. The white-knuckled grip on the shard told Alex that if this wasn't the final piece, if it wasn't so important to Michael's plan of leaving, that it would be hurled across the room in frustration and left to shatter somewhere on the ground. 

"I can't do this to her, and I- I can't do that to you either. You- good luck, Michael."

Michael nodded dumbly, swallowing and Alex could see him visibly trying to piece himself back together again. He just looked at Alex, then away and turned on his heel, head bowed and looking smaller than Alex had ever seen him look. Smaller than he had any right to look.

As he reached the threshold, Alex stumbled forward. "Michael-"

It worked, Michael stopped in his tracks. He didn't look back at Alex, but the tilt to his head indicated that he was paying very close attention to what came next. 

"I'm- I'm glad you're okay. After what happened. And if you wanna talk about Noah or- or anything that went down last night you know where I am."

Michael didn't say anything, Alex thought that was probably more because he didn't trust his voice than anything else. He waited for half a beat more, to see if anything else was coming his way before he ducked his head again and moved out of Alex's cabin, shutting the door behind himself. The backpack was on the floor on the inside of the door, empty, and he heard the hurried sound of Michael's boots as he disappeared, the engine of his truck rumbling into the distance.

Alex leaned his forehead against the door after he'd locked it and closed his eyes and forced himself to remember how to breathe.


End file.
